Lab assignments and discussion for the JOUR 230 students at Lehigh University.

Sunday, May 10, 2015

Kelsey's reflection

Kelsey:
I definitely think that this was a valuable class experience. I learned so much this semester, and especially in areas that I normally struggle with. Despite the fact that both my parents work with computers, I usually am very slow and hesitant to figure out how to use new technology and applications. Even though this course isn’t a requirement for journalism majors, I decided to take it to challenge myself and get over my timidity in reference to technology.
All of the skills we learned this semester-- coding, filming and editing videos, maintaining a social media presence, and being knowledgeable about other forms of data visualization—are so valuable to journalists, so I think that these are definitely capabilities that I will use in my future career.
I also think that the practice of feeling uncomfortable, getting over it, and then feeling confident just diving in is also incredibly invaluable. When we had the twitter scavenger hunt, I felt kind of nervous going up to random faculty and students with my phone, because in the past, I’ve always interviewed people who I’d arranged to meet with ahead of time. Stopping people to interview them on the street is a side of journalism I had not yet experienced, but that’s definitely a part of journalism, and I need to get used to that feeling of never knowing how someone is going to react to my inquiries.
Curation blog: I actually had a funny encounter the other day with my blog! I was talking with a friend, and he asked me randomly if I have a blog. I said yes, and we actually started discussing one of my posts. I was so shocked, because I sometimes forget that people actually read it, and it was such a pleasantly surprising experience to find out that someone had read it and was interested in what I had to say. That’s something that I need to keep in mind, because to me, it’s felt more like a public diary of my thoughts on a particular subject, but I really need to keep in mind the public aspect of it.
Curation twitter: I was surprised, but it was a lot easier to find interesting things to tweet about as the semester went on. I had expected that I might run out of things to say or that the articles would get repetitive. But, contrary to my expectations, I found that once I knew my subject area better, I could sift through and find the articles that appealed to me the most in a much more time-efficient manner. In the beginning of the semester, it would take me hours to find articles or events that I wanted to tweet about. By the end of the semester, I was able to navigate the different sites a lot easier, and I feel a lot more knowledgeable and in tune with what each of them are saying.
Curation online community: I feel like I’ve learned a lot from my online community. Like I said in one of the past check-ins, I find out a lot of international feminist news through reddit, since a lot of the users are from all over the world. It’s interesting to see how different members react to posts. I absolutely love reading the discussions, because everyone has such a unique point. Even though a lot of the members identify as feminists, they do not always agree, so I think that underlines my point that feminism is an umbrella term that embodies so many different points of view.